Next morning:
An interesting newspaper was circulated throughout the kingdom and even in Hage Village. The headlines read:
"For the first time, every single Captain is interested in a talent."
"Know how the Wyvern Slayer Julian, who was chosen by the legendary four-leaf clover Grimoire, made the entire stadium silent with his extraordinary red flames."
Sister Theresa's eyes twitched seeing the headlines. "I told him to show off a little bit, not go overboard! Sigh... what do I do with him?" Still, a smile formed on her face seeing Julian join the Black Bulls. "He will have a lot of people to watch his back there. I am relieved."
Hage Village:
The entire village was in an uproar after reading the newspaper. Tears ran down Father Orsi's face as he read the news. Asta and Yuno had the same thought, "Julian did it, now it's our turn."
---
A few days had passed since Julian settled perfectly in the Black Bulls. Life was going fine. He trained, got delicious food every day, did his part of the cleaning, and hung out with everyone. He received the room that he stayed in the first day he arrived at the base years back.
Julian began his job as a Magic Knight after getting familiar with the system. His days began with patrolling different areas or catering to requests people put through. The next type of work was escort missions to different parts of the country. Some of these escort missions even took 4-5 days.
Julian enjoyed the escort missions as he got to enjoy the scenery and interact with different people. The respect Magic Knights received in small villages was huge. He always had one of the Black Bulls members with him on missions so he didn't get bored.
So far, he had the best friendship with Luck and Magna. They constantly competed in many things while doing missions, of course at a level that didn't hamper the mission or cause extra damage.
Sometimes, Julian received some training from Yami after pestering him a lot. Every day, Julian trained for at least 4 hours, which included physical, weapon, and spell training.
Julian gave every Black Bull member some mana control exercises that Sister Theresa taught him. Dinner was always fun, with everyone sharing something new.
A month after joining the Black Bulls, Julian received his first investigation mission.
Yami handed Julian the mission details, saying, "Wizard King has assigned a mission. Here are the details. Take Magna and Vanessa with you as others are busy. The communication device is with Magna in case of emergency. Good luck!"
Julian took the mission details and called Vanessa from her room and Magna, who was training in the forest.
In a small town of the Common Realm, there were reports of people disappearing. Their job was to investigate the matter.
"We have to continuously fly for two days, so pack some food," Magna said.
"So, you are going on that?" Julian pointed at Magna's weird vehicle made of bones of mana beasts he called 'Crazy Cyclone.'
"Well, people have their preferences." Vanessa sat behind Magna because it was fun for her. Julian flew by using jet flames.
On the way, they took breaks as they didn't have as much mana to spare as Julian. If they used mana points to compare, Magna had around 90 and Vanessa around 150. Although mana rotation with natural mana gave Julian almost endless mana, he could only control around 220 mana points.
During the week at the base, Julian spent a lot of time in the library and figured out something unusual.
The library had some books that were mandatory for every squad to read. Apparently, some mages tried forming different organs within their bodies to store mana but always failed, and in some cases, their bodies exploded. Even experienced people failed. So this was declared a forbidden practice with a zero success rate.
It was concluded that mana could only be stored externally. But Julian suffered no backlash, and his mana core felt natural, reminding him that his body was different from others.
Julian never knew who his parents were, so it may have something to do with it. There was a chance he was an elf since William showed interest in him. And the vision he received during getting his grimoire raised more questions. Either it was the memory of the previous grimoire wielder or someone implanted extra memories within him.
On the way, they saw different sceneries, and Julian enjoyed the trip overall. They landed near the village in the evening, but as soon as they entered the village, they clearly felt the environment changing. The perfectly fine houses from outside seemed damaged as they entered the village.
"Use a layer of mana to cover your face," Julian alerted. When they approached some of the villagers, they figured that most of them were half-dazed. They tried to ask different questions, but all of them were giving the same answer as if told to repeat the same. They had no change in expression even when asked about disappearing villagers. They gathered outside the village for a conclusion.
"What do you think happened?" Magna asked.
"People are being controlled," Vanessa said.
Magna continued, "People are repeating the same lines with no facial expression. There are many things involved together."
"There is strong illusion magic covering the village. The mana signature I sensed around the villagers is less than the report we received. Moreover, along with illusion magic, the atmosphere is messing around with people's minds who can't protect their senses. That's why I said to cover your face with mana," Julian explained.
"We should take action as soon as possible, or more people may disappear. This is a remote area; no reinforcements can be expected," Vanessa said.
During midnight, they re-entered the village and went towards the area with the most mana fluctuations Julian sensed. They reached one corner of the village with a big house.
"This house is a complete illusion but different from the one the village is covered with. How do we break the illusion?" Julian asked, knowing brute force wasn't always an option.
Magna answered while checking the corners of the house, "As Captain once mentioned, most barrier-based illusion magic originates from a point the magic is cast. The mage loses contact with the spell after casting. If we overwhelm that point, the illusion will break. Now get to work and start finding that point. But if the mage is experienced, we will give away our positions. My mana is not suitable for it. Julian will break it."
It took about fifteen minutes to search every corner around the house, and Julian finally found the spot behind the house and broke it by overpowering it with his mana. The illusion broke, revealing a big hole with a staircase reaching the bottom. They entered the staircase, making as little noise as possible.
While they broke the illusion, underground, various villagers were standing with their eyes closed in a line, their mana and vitality being absorbed by large tubes.
Around 20 people in weird dress with a three-eyes symbol on their backs and covering their faces were standing around the large tubes while a woman with one eye covered was sitting on a large chair.
She put down a device and said, "Get rid of the useless ones and bring the new batch. We have to cover the entire village by tomorrow. We can't fail our first mission given by the lord." While she was giving other instructions, one of the grunts panicked and said, "Boss, someone broke the illusion! Someone is here!"
She shouted angrily, "Huh! You incompetent fool, you can't even cast proper illusions! Men, prepare for battle, we have intruders!"
Meanwhile, Julian and his team encountered many traps. These were low-level alarm traps, so they managed to dodge them perfectly. While traveling, they sensed movements in their direction, realizing they had been found out. When they reached the end of the base entrance, they were greeted with a barrage of spells. Julian instinctively used 'Blazing Shield' to block the attacks, while Magna used his baseball bat of fire to strike back, and Vanessa used strings to bind their attackers.
"I sense many mana signatures in the chamber ahead. I suggest we form two different teams and take them out," Julian suggested.
"SURE!" Magna agreed.
"Be careful," Vanessa cautioned.
They split into two teams. Julian shot towards the direction with the largest mana signature. Two mages attacked him on the way. He took out his dagger and slashed towards their legs, cutting off their tendons and making them fall. He quickly stabbed them from behind, purposely missing their vital organs. While fighting, he recognized the dress they were wearing; it belonged to the Eye of the Midnight Sun.
But when Julian was about to slash the woman with the largest mana signature, he suddenly found himself in a dark place without sound or vision. Realizing his hearing and vision were blocked, he didn't lose his vigilance, relying on his Ki to react to attacks.
Soon after, he heard a voice all around him with a teasing tone, "Ara Ara! What do we have here, a handsome magic knight with so much mana? Sigh, I could have played with you, but I am short on time, you see. You shouldn't have interfered in our work without knowing anything, boy. Don't blame me for the consequences of your actions."